Since shortly after MC21 was released I've been using the new and improved video support. I've tried a few other video "managers" in the past, and was turned off by the interfaces. It was really hard to get started and in most cases video managers for OSX want to be used as a server that talks to some other computer or set top box that displays video. As opposed to watching video directly on the OSX machine.
Well, it turns out that pretty much everything I was looking for was right here in MC! All of the power we've gotten used to with cataloging and displaying Audio, is right here for video. MC finds most metadata about Movies and TV shows automatically, including descriptions, cover art, actors, and other details. Browsing your video collection is a lot like audio: You've got views based on looking at the Movie cover art, as well as Panes based views... essentially everything you can do for Audio, you can do for Video.
Tagging TV shows so they show up logically is really easy and very well set up: Series name, Season, and Episode make it just super easy. I've got a small collection of TV shows on DVD ripped into my computer. Organizing them took a little bit of trial and error, but once I figured it out, the result is easy to navigate and very pleasing. Organized media is wonderful.
So far, I don't think anything I've told you is new for MC21. I *think* all of this was available in MC20 as well. But I never used it in MC20. Why? Because video support in MC20 was pretty lack luster. MC21 has made several major changes that have taken video support from almost unusable to absolutely workable for day to day use!
1. Full screen support via the Display View (Command-3) is perfect now. Mouse disappears after a few seconds. The control and display bar at the top disappears and reappears on demand. No more funny bars on screen. No more mouse stuck on screen. No more display hanging out up top. It all works exactly as you'd expect it to.
2. Support for multiple embedded audio streams. This is very important as far as I'm concerned. Nearly all of my movie files that came from DVD have more than one audio track. Sometimes it's a stereo mix and a Dolby Digital 5.1 mix. Sometimes there's a director's commentary. Sometimes all three. Or even more. Now you can easily select what you want on the fly via: Player > Display Options > Streams . Even DTS seems to be natively supported. I don't know why I'm surprised by this, but it's a very pleasant surprise!
3. The long awaited Subtitle Support is here. I don't have a lot of subtitled movies, but the ones I have are in languages I don't speak much of (if at all). So this is essential. It seems to work fine, though I haven't tested it beyond just a cursory look.
If you can't tell, I'm really excited about the new video support. It's really changed MC for me. It's not just the best Audio manager and player around. Now it's also the best video manager I've seen. I've gone from using VLC and Quicktime player for all of my video playing to using MC for more than 95% of my video viewing. Pretty much the only thing I'm going to use an external player for are unusual files that have trouble in MC (like broken video files), or for "one off" videos I download that I'm not going to keep.
Having my Movies, TV Shows, and other videos organized, easy to navigate, with beautiful cover art, all the power of MC's Library, AND a player that plays just about everything I throw at it is AWESOME. I'm loving it and I think if you try it, you will too.
Brian.
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Topic: New Video Support for Mac and Why it's Awesome (Read 8306 times)